Lock in the roller about 1 inch from the bowl & you should be okay. You'll have to adjust it in or out depending on the size of your batches. Do not leave it tight against the bowl.

+1 on that. I use the roller on the initial mixing until the dough comes together, 20 minute autolyse and then to the dough hook. On large batches (over 10#) I do keep an eye on to ensure it doesn't build behind the hook and go up under the arm.

David, the ineffectiveness of the creeper gizmo was related to me by another member who found it ineffective. The largest batch I have mixed so far is ~950gm of dough and it didn't seem to creep up the center shaft. Hopefully sooner than later, I will mix up a 1500gm batch or so to see if it does.

Looking at the dough creeper gizmo, it is made of a flexible plastic. I can visually dough coming up the column and just pushing it aside. The design may be sound but the materials they use don't appear to be. If it was made from a much more stiff plastic or even metal, I bet it would work fine.

If someone has the tools, know how, and interest in replicating this piece using SS, I would be more than happy to put it to the test.

if you scan the image next to a ruler i will replicate it for you in SS

It was a tad on the chewy side but not bad at all. I agree with Scott r that I will likely decrease my knead time by 1/2 base on Test #3. I just wanted to say that the extra kneading didn't seem to hurt the dough that much. The pie was truely good and one of my better ones.

I opted to use a different recipe and method to fit my needs. I was wanting to make a loaf of bread and wanted to play with blending AP/HG flour so I decided on a NY style recipe with this blend of flours.

Here's the recipe I used for anyone interested. This was to be an emergency dough and I only had about a 4 hour window to make bread and pizza. If anyone is interested in using this recipe but would rather have a longer fermentation time, then simply reduce the amount of yeast accordingly.

Flour blend 100% (2/3 AP, 1/3 HG)Water 63%IDY 1%Salt 2%Sugar 1%oil 2%

For my particular climate I upped the hydration a bit (from Scott's 59%) despite using 2/3 AP flour. I felt the dough to be a bit on the dry side. Next time I will up the HR a bit more.

I ended up mixing this for about 12 min which is longer than I wanted but was trying to fix a problem that I had created. I had taken too long to manually incorporate some of the drier dough from the sides of the bowl which I attempted to mix in later at higher speeds without success. As a result the dough got mixed longer than I had intended and still had a few dry bits in it.

Next time, I will only add about 50% of the flour or just enough to create a loose batter and then add the rest in incrementally.

Anyways the pizza came out excellent. One of the better pies I've made in the home oven. I would have to attribute this to the bosch mixer, and the sauce I made.

The sauce: I tried to recreate grimaldi's sauce by taste. I have no idea how close or far I was, but this was an excellent NY style sauce.

I really like the even browning of the rim and the crumb looks just about perfect.

A couple of questions.

What was your oven setup, bake time and stone temp?

Are you adding water first to the bosch as opposed to flour first? I think adding flour first was the reason for my initial lack of success with the throw it all in and blend method. It seems to matter in this machine for some reason.

Ponzu, I think you are right. The water has to go in first for best results. Also, that even browning you see on JT nice looking NH pie is probably the result of the oil, and or sugar. Pie looks great JT. -marc

Oven setup: Viking Oven that seems to only heat from the top broiler plate (i know it's weird). Primo ceramic stone mid oven. Preheat for 40min or so at 500F or until a stone temp of 700F. Loaded pie and baked around 6min turning the pie 2-3 times. After 6min or so, the top and sides of the rim were brown but hadn't developed that charred look so I rimmed it against the broiler. Turned the broiler on so it's actively firing.

Alexi, I always add water first whether mixing with bosch or by hand. Water, dissolve salt & sugar. Next add the oil and yeast, then flour. To get an even mixing whether by hand or mixer, when working with relatively low hydrated doughs, I feel it's important to add 50% or less of the flour initially to get an even batter and then add the rest of the flour in at once or slowly. This seems (to me) to be a requisite if using a relative low hydration ratio. At higher hydration ratios, I can dump everything in and turn the mixer on and will get a smooth mix regardless. With a lower hydration dough care has to be taken to get an even initial wet batter otherwise I run the risk of getting clumps if I dump it all in at once. The reason for this is b/c when mixing in the Bosch, if you'll not that there is usually a bit of dough that is not being mixed along the center shaft, stuck to the mixing arms or along the walls of the bowl. With a drier dough, there seems to be more residual dough hanging around. If too much flour is added at once, there seems to be dry bits that don't incorporate well especially after a few minutes of mixing when the gluten is already beginning to develop. A possible work around is to mix initially on high speeds to incoporate everything well, let the dough rest, then go back and knead at a slower speed. This is how I did things by hand so it should be the same for using a mixer. Hope that makes sense. This may vary from mixer to mixer, user to user, and with varying hydration levels. This is just what I have found to be true for me.

Bobino, Bonnie has been doing very well considering the quick transition. I've been keeping her fairly busy mixing and kneading. Just the other day she helped me make some wonderful bread and pizza.

I'm also adjusting to her special needs as well. Just the other day, I put her mixing attachment into the dishwasher. The center portion of her mixing arms became very discolored . After consulting the parenting manual it does clearly state that the mixing mechanism needs to be hand washed. Her little mixing arms also got a few nicks on them from being in the dishing washer. Apparently I need to take better care of her.

Uncle Jon (member C0mpl3x) is making her a little SS toy (dough creeper gizmo) to play with. I'm sure she'll be really happy with it when it arrives.

I wanted to see if I could reproduce this type of window paning by hand kneading. I have window paned one of my own hand kneaded doughs ages ago but haven't really documented if the dough would windowpane after 20 min and what the dough would look like after 50 min.

Here's 2 videos I made today of a HG bromated flour dough. Hand mixed and kneaded for about 6-7min. Window paned after a 20m & 50m rest.

Some thoughts: The bosch can definitely mix a smoother dough than I can by hand. It's great for doing large batches of dough, saves time and energy. Is a mixer absolutely necessary? NO - you can make great pizza dough by hand. This same effect can be done with any other mechanical mixer. Do I love my new Bosch? You betcha. For someone doing small batches, I would just stick to hand kneading.

Ok here are the same doughballs proofed up after 7 hours and ready to be baked.

Jackie, what do you consider a small batch? I think my bosch still beats out my hand kneading with small batches, but I may just suck at hand kneading Maybe you are talking really small. Because I always have hungry people around the smallest batch I would ever do would be 2 16 inch pizzas or 4 300g neapolitan pies. how many a/b comparisons have you done to come to this conclusion?

Hey Scott, I agree with you. The Bosch can still beat out my hand kneaded doughs in terms of smoothness even in small batches. Especially with a lower protein flour like AP or 00, it can develop the gluten much quicker than I can by hand.

I guess I would consider a small batch maybe just enough dough to make a 16" pie or 2 small 12" pies. This particular batch is about 370gm. I have found that my bosch won't mix a batch smaller than 400gm. For anything bigger than that or using a low protein flour (00) I would happily use a mixer. I do these small batches (<400gm) and make two 11" pies when just making experimental pizza for myself.

I haven't done a lot of a/b comparisons, just saying that it is possible to hand knead a dough and achieve windowing paning in 20min. Again, I love my Bosch, I just don't want people to think that they absolutely need a Bosch to get window paning. It can be done by hand kneading. I have also achieved this effect with use of a food processor and a Kitchen Aid mixer. Anyone should also be able to easily achieve this effect with any mixer.

If there is enough interest, I would consider shooting a video of the hand kneading technique I used to achieve this.